The romance of youth and other poems

THE LIBRARY

OF

THE UNIVERSITY

OF CALIFORNIA

RIVERSIDE

Ex Libris
ISAAC FOOT '
- - -^ -*- * * A A

THE ROMANCE OF YOUTH

The Romance of Youth

JiND OTHER POEMS

REV. E. E.'^BRADFORD, D.D.

(Coll. Exon., Oxon.)

Author of Sonnets, Songs and Ballads, Passing the Love of
Women, In Quest of Love, Lays of Love and Life,
The Nevp Chivalry

LONDON

KEGAN PAUL, TRENCH, TRUBNER & Co., Ltd.

Broadway House, 68-74 Carter Lane, E.G.

■tr

The Romance of Youth

I

Poetry ....

8

Truth ....

lO

The Love Divine

11

Boyhood

12

Aphrodite Pandemos

• 13

A Starry Night .

• 14

The Parting

i6

The Church on the Hill

. i8

Maying . . . .

31

A Child

23

Outward Bound .

24

The Age of Fairy Tales

25

Guy

27

The Dove

28

The Boy Ideal

29

Montague

32

Rupert

33

At Evensong

34

Sweet Solitude

36

The Vagabond Boy

39

Summer Heat

40

Angels of Death

42

vi. CONTENTS

A Child of Light 43

Warblers

44

Society

45

The Children's Mission

47

An Ancient Town

50

Wild Animals ....

53

A Summer Night ....

. 54

My Holiday Home

. 56

The Fisher Boy ....

■ 57

The Boy Acrobat

58

Shells

59

" Brown Town on Cameron Down "

. 61

Expelled

. 62

A String Quartette

. 64

August

. 66

The Lonely Road ....

67

Autumn Gold ....

. 69

Twilight

• 70

The Harvest Moon

• 71

Fellow Feeling ....

. 72

The Pine Wood ....

. 74

A Brief Life (A Sonnet Sequence)

. 76

Resurrection ....

. 81

The Cycle of Thought

. 82

"Rex Regum" • . . .

85

Stranger and Pilgrim

. 86

The Romance of Youth.

" He whom the gods love dearly dies in youth ".

So sang the poet in the pagan past :

So, in a sort, dies every boy in sooth ;

Romantic, ardent, joyous to the last,

He runs to welcome Death, who holds him fast ;

And even as we gaze the Boy is gone.

The virile toga round his form is cast.

And " not unclothed " by Death " but clothed upon "

Into a larger life he swiftly passes on.

The Boy is dead : the Man is not the Boy
Save as the disembodied Saint is Man.
Behold his eyes have lost the light of joy ;
The naked feet on which to Death he ran.
Are booted with the buskins of grave plan
Or socks of dalliance. His curls, confined
By cap or crown, no careless breeze can fan,
Nor loving finger fondle. Calm, resigned,
He marches tow'rd the night, and leaves the dawn
behind.

2 THE ROMANCE OF YOUTH

Yet Childhood's dawn is part of Nature's plan :

The Boy's the treble of her harmony.

He understands her secrets more than Man,

And serves as link with bird and beast and tree.

His heart beats closer to the mystery

Of Universal Being, and his eyes

Perceive a Light that ours no longer see —

A light that lingers in the sunset skies,

Gleams faintly in the stars, and never wholly dies.

For though the boy may pass, the Boy Ideal
Will live for ever. In the hero's soul
He reigns supreme, and Saints and Sages kneel
Before his throne, for Nature's perfect whole
Is not entire without him. Fawn and foal,
Shrill-bleating lamb, all beings fair and small,
Shy woodland creatures — squirrel, stoat and mole,
Invisible birds that in the twilight call —
All share his sweet romance, but he transcends them
all.

The Boy reigned in Judaea as her King,

Her Saint, her Bard, her Prophet. 'Tis a Boy

Who never ceases in her psalms to sing

His Heavenly Father's care. His harp's a toy,

And to the end he is a child — the same

As he who eyed his friend, reserved and coy,

But gravely happy, both his cheeks aflame

With that all-glorious love that leaves no after shame.

THE ROMANCE OF YOUTH

He reigned in Greece : it was a wayward Boy,

But lovable, and pure, and twice as fair

As man can ever be, who sulked at Troy,

Nursing a petty feud — too young to bear -

His weight of glory and his people's care.

But by good hap a faithful friend and strong.

Yet tender as a mother mild was there,

Who dying in his stead, drew him along

With silken cords of love to join the immortal throng.

Reigned he in Rome } One melancholy youth

Reigned in the heart of him who reigned o'er all :

But was the fair Bithynian Boy in truth

The idol of the Romans? I recall

No love like David's for the son of Saul ;

But low intrigues with slaves and pampered pages,

And frolicking with freedom — what a fall

From that pure passion sanctioned by her sages

And handed down by Greece to all succeeding ages !

In Britain boys are friendless : happy they
Whose youth is spent in shadow : for the few
Whom Birth or Genius lightens with a ray
Of early fame, grow dazzled, and pursue
Their aftercourse at hazard, as steeds do
Alarmed and riderless: and many a one
For lack of a protector kind and true,
Has died in youth ; as David might have done.
Had not his heartless king a kinder-hearted son.

4 THE ROMANCE OF YOUTH

Behold yon gallant youth with golden hair
That streams behind him like a comet's tail,
Who gallops gaily on a courser fair
To beard a scowling mob. A trifle pale,
But calm and confident, the stripling frail
Essays alone to win the rebel crowd.
His courtiers stand in doubt. Will youth prevail }
One breathless moment all the host is cowed,
Then Man acclaims the boy with plaudits long and
loud.

O that a friend with virile heart and brain

Had loved him ere that glorious day was done,

Caressed and cockered him, in prophet strain,

Dubbed him the great Black Prince's genial son.

Yet while well-pleased with what was well begun,

Suggested greater consequents, and so

By hortatory adulation won

The wayward will to virtue ! But the glow

Of generous fire flared out, and died in ashes low.

Arthur of Brittany — the little ghost

That hovers round King John — the luckless twain

King Edward and young York, as wan almost

As their white roses, sought and sought in vain

A single faithful friend : and once again

We meet a boy King Edward, friendless too,

When fatherless he entered on his reign :

THE ROMANCE OF YOUTH 5

Pale patron saint of the pale scholar crew
He knew and shared their toil, their prize he never
knew.

And they whom Genius lightened fared as ill.

There was a boy whom all men marvelled at

But none befriended. In a parvis still

At eve alone with lean Church mouse and rat,

Watched by the blinking owl and wheeling bat,

He penned his wondrous poems, till he passed

Into a city attic, where he sat

More lonely still, in solitude more vast.

Until he found in Death one kindly friend at last.

And Adonais, had he met a mate —

Some young Endymion or Calidore —

Might not he to have triumphed over fate

And kept the crown he won but never wore .''

But when he wandered on the Devon shore,

Or sauntered sadly o'er the Scottish heath,

A lonely exile sick at heart and sore.

He tells us almost with his latest breath

He was already " half in love with easeful Death."

It is not good the Boy should be alone :
He needs an helpmeet even more than man.
Yet if the brethren of his flesh and bone
Are framed and fashioned on a diverse plan,
A Joseph, or a lion's whelp like Dan

6 THE ROMANCE OF YOUTH

Destined to leap from Bashan, lives apart

Most homeless when at home. None will or can

Light up the dark recesses of his heart,

Bind up his spirit's wounds, or mollify their smart.

Most lonely at the festival ol love, ^J

He pines amid uproarious jollity :

The frosty stars in the chill vault above

Are not more far removed from mirth than he !

While rhythmic music, dance, and cries of glee

Throb round him in the lighted drawing-room,

He sadly eyes the tempest-shaken tree

That seems to beckon to him from the gloom.

What should be home to him's a prison or a tomb !

Could he but steal away and be at rest
With mother Nature and one favourite friend,
Pillow his head on some responsive breast.
Lay bare his heart, and let his Mentor blend
Sweet comfort with wise counsel at the end,
How often would the boyish Ishmaelite,
The stubborn rebel, the child Cain unbend :
For he who braves the boisterous wind's rude might,
Will cast away his cloak when once the sun shines
bright.

He cannot plead for love — his heart's in trance,
A Sleeping Beauty. Surely he has no need ?
His innocence, his halo of romance,

THE ROMANCE OF YOUTH 7

His boyish bloom, his very dumbness plead !

Is there no knight from lower passion freed

To succour him who has no power to call,

And can requite his service with no meed ?

Is there no Galahad or Parsifal,

Who finds in heavenly love the highest bliss of all ?

Love of the heart alone — Love all romance,
All tenderness, all purity and light,
Will wake the Sleeping Beauty from his trance,
Ennoble him, and glorify his Knight :
And when the world has seen this vision bright,
All Love will be transfigured, for the boy
So crowned in youth, and early robed in white.
Will look at woman with a purer eye.
And seek from her, in turn, the Love that cannot
die.

Poetry.

From earliest childhood have I seen at times
A fleeting Beauty, exquisite and rare.

But when I strove to fix it in my rhymes,
No other eye than mine could see it there :
The life had gone, the words lay cold and bare.

This radiance, delicate and fugitive,

Is not mere loveliness of form and line ;

But more like sunlight, which has power to give
A grace to all on which it deigns to shine,
Gilding the meanest things with gold divine.

It comes and goes as swiftly : now and then
It glorifies a little group of trees,

A lonely road, a lake, a twilight glen :

It sweeps across them, like a passing breeze,
Displaying more than mortal eye e'er sees.

I find it most in savage Nature : still
'Tis only latent in her. I may gaze

POETRY 9

Long hours unmoved at sea and plain and hill,
Then suddenly it shimmers thro' a haze,
And passes rapidly from phase to phase.

It lights my spirit rather than my eyes,
Suggesting more than I can ever see :

Sometimes, I think, awaking memories

As Plato taught : sometimes it seems to me
Like a foretaste of bliss about to be.

And afterwards I feel as one who wakes
Reluctant from a dream, and strives in vain

To dream once more, and for this purpose makes
A recapitulation, bare and plain,
Of what he saw, and hopes to see again.

Of this I am resolved — I will not smear
My canvas with excess of gaudy paint,

But keep at least the outline firm and clear ;
And if the colouring be cold and faint.
No matter so 'tis free from earthly taint.

Truth.

I will not weave of lovely lies
A wimple veil to shield my soul,

Bnt rather with unhooded eyes

Face naked Truth and see her whole.

I will not drift in idle dreams

On moonlight meres of poppied bliss,
But rather from the world that seems

I will awake to that which is —

The glorious world of wold and wood,
The world of blithesome birds and boys,

The world that whispers " God is good,
And takes delight in all our joys ! "

The Love Divine.

When do I mean by the Love Divine ?

I mean all love but the love of self :
For the love of women, the love of wine,

The love of honour and power and pelf,
Or e'en of an idol in a shrine —
The creature of a human brain —

Who duly apportions pleasure and pain,
Life and death, and heaven and hell

To those who serve him ill or well —
What are these but the love of self ?

But I think at the back of all that is
There is One Whom man can never see,

The Fount of Beauty and Love and Bliss,
Who dwells in white Eternity :

And Space and Time are rays of His,
And all that is pure and undefiled

In Nature and Man and Woman and Child
Is His reflection, blurred and dim —
And the love of this is the love of Him —
The Invisible Deity.

B

Boyhood.

Boyhood I worship rather than the boy ;

And boyhood but as part of Nature's whole,
Her fairest blossom, telHng of her joy

Her hope her love ; the tongue whereby her soul,
Imprisoned in the brute, still hardly freed.

Not wholly dumb nor quite articulate,
Not warped by prejudice nor cramped by creed,

Babbles of deepest mysteries of fate.
And if awhile I worship one alone,

That one to me is Nature, and a vision.
Though blurred, of Him Who sits upon her throne,

And sheds His glory on the fields Elysian. J

But boy, as boy, is not so inly dear
As man, my fellow-worshipper and peer.

Aphrodite Pandemos-

Loveless, low Love is love alone in name :

Not Love but Hate inspires her feints and ruses.
Her commerce is a sordid gambling game,
Wherein one wins but what another loses :
Shameless, she craftily pretends to shame.

And oft at first her favours she refuses.
Only that later she may sell the same

More dearly at the day and hour she chooses.
Infamous, brags she of immortal fame,

As hymned by bards and favoured of the Muses
Cold, she yet dares to vaunt her lustful flame,

And Friendship of frigidity accuses :
And simple youths, who scorn the Love divine,
Follow this Circe and become her swine.

A Starry Night.

Wild winds of March are piping shrill
In wold and wooded alley,

They bow the birches on the hill,
And the willows in the valley.

But through a lace-like tracery
Of branches dark and slender,

There gleams a starry canopy
Of palpitating splendour :

The Greater and the Lesser Bear,
The Dragon and the Lion,

Cassiopeia in her chair,

And spangle-decked Orion :

While single gems of brilliant light
Flash out beyond the others —

Aldebaran, Capella bright,
And the Celestial Brothers.

A STARRY NIGHT 15

How young and fair they all appear !

And Earth, could I behold her,
Now in the Springtime of the year,

Would doubtless seem no older.

And shall not ive renew our youth,

As eagles do in story,
And young and fair as they in sooth
Soar up to God in glory ?

How sweet to be a boy again —

Not what I was, but would be :
The boy I yearned to be in vain.

But knew I never could be :

The Boy Ideal, strong and brave,

Endowed with beauty flawless,
Gay as the gales of March, and save

To Love's sweet law as lawless.

A boy like many a comrade dear.

Not fallen in war but risen,
Too full of life to linger here.

Too free for this our prison.

And will it be in Springtime wild,
Some starry night and stormy,

I'll wing my way, once more a child.
To the children gone before me }

The Parting.

Two boys had met to bid " goodbye,"

One was my friend, the other 1 ;

He was going home — going home to die.

I know for long he talked to me,
But I think I only heard the sea —
It moaned and moaned incessantly,

I dared not look at him — I saw
The wind play with a wisp of straw :
'Twas early Spring and cold and raw.

But when the station came in sight
Through parted clouds the sun shone bright.
Flooding the world with warmth and light.

A moment later in the train

I glanced at, with a stab of pain,

The face 1 never saw again.

THE PARTING 17

The train went out : dark grew the sky

And all at once tempestuously

A storm of hail swept far and nigh.

But darkness could not blot or kill
That sunlit face — it never will :
By night and day I see it still.

The Church on the Hill.

Cold, clean, calm and still

Gleams the Church upon the hill,

Sandy is the soil around,

Furze and heather there abound,

And blocks of granite strew the ground.

I like it well in winter time
When all the world is white with rime ;
But even more in early Spring
When butterflies are on the wing,
And willow-wrens return and sing.

Because its cold's not that of death.
But like the snow that serves as sheath
For little shoots of tender green.
All full of vigorous life and keen.
But life just budding hardly seen.

When gales of March sweep o'er the moor
I linger at its open door

THE CHURCH ON THE HILL 19

To see the sun big, strong- and bold,
Arrayed in red, and crowned with gold,
Die gaily as Saints died of old.

Within, though all is clean and fair,
It looks a little cold and bare.
While every window pane is stained,
The tints are dim, the art restrained,
All is subdued and self-contained.

The crucifix, of silver bright,
Gleams palely in the candle-light :
And round about the holy rood
Are cups of roses in the bud
As red as little drops of blood.

The worshippers are few : of these
Brave Scottish boys with naked knees
Form more than half. Their eyes are clear.
Their tones are shrill and sweet to hear.
And they sing of Love that knows no fear :

Love that flows from God on high,
Love that cannot change or die,
Love that fills the human heart.
Flooding every secret part,
So keen at first it makes it smart.

I see it in their shining eyes,

20 THE CHURCH ON THE HILL

The love that burns and sanctifies :
I hear it in their ringing tones
Above the wind that sadly moans,
As Nature in her travail groans.

Cold, clean, calm and still,

Gleams the Church upon the hill :

'Tis like the heart ot one aflame

With that pure love that leaves no shame,

And turns to God from whence it came.

Maying,

Love flew by at the dawn o' the day,

Glorious, radiant, glowing,
Leaving a light all over the bay
And setting the cocks a-crowing.
" Up ! " cried he, " 'Tis the first of May,

Up and away ! Away ! Away ! "
" Nay, Love," said I, " I fain would sleep.
Why do you wake me but to weep ?
/ cannot go a-Maying."

Boys ran by at the dawn o' the day

Filling the world with laughter :
Eagerly running to bathe in the bay.
But the fairest of all came after.
" On ! " cried Love, " 'Tis the first of May,

Up and away ! Away ! Away ! "
"Nay Love, why haste? My mother is dead

And never a friend have I," he said,
'* How can I go a-Maying ? "

22 MAYING

Then up rose I at the dawn o' the day,
I had done with sorrow and sleeping ;

The boys were bathing all over the bay,
But the fairest of all was weeping.
" Sweet," said I, " 'Tis the first of May ;

Up and away ! Away ! Away !

Will you come with me? I am lonely too."

He said with a sob, " I will come with you,"
So together we went a-Maying.

A Child.

His hair is glossy as a horse-chestnut,

And closely curls about his forehead white :
His features are so delicately cut

That they would fill a sculptor with delight :
His shadowy eyes are blue and tender, but

The great black pupils with their stars of light,
Dilating or contracting as they shut

Or open wide, gleam like the skies at night.
His lightly-bronzed and glowing boyish face

Is flushed as douds are at the dawn of day ;
And all his form is moulded with such grace

That seeing it I'm fain to kneel and pray :

But when I touch, and feel 'tis mortal clay,
I ache to fold it in a close embrace.

Outward Bound.

Into the sea had the red sun set,

And out of it rose the moon :
The waves were white, and the decks were wet,

And the gale began to croon.

So I said to the friend that by chance I had met,

" Go down to the warm saloon ! "
But he always prayed me, " Please not yet ! "

As if to stay were a boon.

So we talked all night till the moon had set,
And the sun had succeeded the moon :

And the friend that I met I shall never forget,
Nor will he forget me soon.

The Age of Fairy Tales.

Before the town and castle grey,
Long leagues of marish moorland lay,"
Where lark and linnet sang all day,

And there at times at night
The ruddy flare of cresset fires,
And tocsins from a hundred spires.
Warned doughty knights and limber squires

Sea-robbers were in sight.

A forest filled the vale behind

And here freebooters one might find

Sworn enemies of all mankind,

Who ravised, robbed and slew.
But from his eyry on the hill
Some starry night, when all was still,
The Knight would swoop, and catch or kill

The corybantic crew.

In peaceful days he rode instead,
In surcoat of rich samite red.

26 THE AGE OF FAIRY TALES

To prove his force and goodlyhead
In many a joust and tourney.
Or if his Prince a vow had made
To seek the palms that never fade,
He followed him on some crusade
Or holy pilgrim journey.

But ere life's evening- shadows came
With every knight it was the same —
He won his bride, and Knight and dame

Lived happy ever after.
Not such an end would I desire,
No rest on earth do I require,
I'll ride attended by rny squire

To meet dark Death with laughter !

Guy.

Do I know Guy ? Aye, and I knew him as a boy.

Do I like him ? Like ? I love him !
Few friends have I that I rank as high ;

Not one do I class above him.

But to know Guy why you must meet him as a boy
When a shy man's shell-case hardens,

'Tis by and by nigh as cold and dry
As the tortoise's in your gardens.

The Dove.

A dove with a wounded pinion

Dwells in a sunless room,
With a cage for her sole dominion,
Narrow and dark as a tomb :
But she welcomes all who come to view
With a gay little laugh and a long low coo.

I would not cry with the Psalmist

" O for the wings of a dove ! "
But " O for her heart ! " — the calmest
The fullest of trustful love !

I think no realm man's feet have trod

Holds a heart more close to the Heart of God.

The Boy Ideal.

I

How often in my solitary rambles
I see the Boy Ideal on my way,
As Moses saw God's glory in the brambles.

Here as a careless child he rides in play

Bare-footed on a gate, his laughter ringing
Above the whistling winds of March. The day

Is bright though keen : the children round him
swinging,

A ragged troop, are joyous as their chief ;
And soaring larks in sympathy are singing :

What should the Boy Ideal know of grief?

II

One Summer morn I see him as a slender

But lusty youth, afloat upon his back,
His gently-heaving bosom, white and tender,

30 THE BOY IDEAL

Swells out above long strands of glaucous wrack,

While raven locks, e'en in the water curly.
Spread round his head and form a nimbus black.

The sun is hot, although the hour is early,

And in its rays he basks with languid mien ;
His softly-rounded body, pure and pearly,

Set in a frame of dusky olive-green,

'Mid viscid jelly-fish and dank sea-flowers,

Laver, dark dulse, and pallid carageen :
Here he's a merman in his native bowers.

Ill

In Autumn on a lofty hill that towers

High o'er long leagues of undulating land.
Below a lurid purple cloud that lowers

With thunder fraught, he heads a joyous band.

Incarnate as a vagabond, the very
Picture of health, dark-eyed, red-cheeked, sun-
tanned.

Intent on loot, marauders blithe and merry.
Through thorny thickets valiantly they press.

Rifling the brambles of the juicy berry,
Robbers like Bedouins in the Wilderness.

THE BOY IDEAL 31

IV

In wintertide, as wearily I wander

Through snowy byways, tow'ard the close of day
I spy an old dark-timbered mansion yonder.

One mullioned window, through the twilight grey

Gleams like a star : within, on raftered ceiling
And wainscot wall, firelight and shadow play.

Here, through the lattice, with the eerie feeling
Of one who dreams awake, once more I spy
The Boy Ideal, now an Angel kneeling

Before his bedside Altar. With his eye
Fixed upon Heav'n, oblivious of beholders,

He's wrapt in prayer : I think I can descry

Bright gauzy wings around his shapely shoulders !

Montague.

My heart went out to Montague ;

Did his respond to mine?
His smile said " Yes ; " his eyes did too.

But still I sought a sign.
I sought a sign the whole day through,

But 'twas not till the night I knew.
And how did I divine?
By this — that when we bade adieu
One moment more than others do

He left his hand in mine.
'Twas as we stood alone, we two,
Beneath the stars with none to view,
For a moment more than others do

He left his hand in mine.

Rupert.

His mother and I are fellow worshippers,

His heart is her's as much or more than mine ;
But when we play beneath the dusky firs,

Breast-high in bracken, she can ne'er divine
What 'tis to be a Robin Hood. Not her's

But mine is he when serpent lightnings shine
And thunder roars, or when the fierce gale stirs

The rolling surge and drenches us with brine.

An rosy apples on forbidden trees

Cry " Come and catch me if you dare ! " she hears
No witching voice. When o'er the soughing breeze
Blare fife and drum, no beckoning hand appears
To bid her march. O then the boy's my own,
Heart soul and body mine, and mine alone !

At Evensong.

Now in the priory windows in the West

Shine radiant saints in rainbow-tinted glass,
But in the mystic East the Altar, dressed

With fragrant blooms and bright with burnished
brass,
Is only taper-lit. One ruddy star,
The silver sanctuary lamp on high,

Illumes the dim triforium, while in gloom,
In mortuary chapels banished far,
'Neath canopies of state in glory lie

Pale marble knights, each sleeping on his tomb.

The bell no longer tolls : the organ drones

Like a leviathan in restless sleep,
Till plaintively above the pedal tones

The keen vibrating reeds begin to creep :
Then from a bright boy-angel in the stalls,

Clear as a silver trumpet, rings a cry

So shrill, so sweet it pierces to the heart.

AT EVENSONG 35

Soon all the choir's alive with woodland calls
Until the very vaulted roof on high
Re-echoing seems fain to bear its part.

The darkness deepens, but a portal wide

Beyond the nave displays a shimmering sea,
Wherein the weary sun begins to glide,

And drowning, dies with meek tranquility.
Between are silent streets and shady lanes,

Broad bridges over which no wagons go,
And idle marts deserted by the throng :
While, near at hand, through cottage window panes

Shine forth the stars of home with cheery glow,
And all the world's at peace at evensong.

Sweet Solitude.

The restless train that all the livelong day

Has sped from town to town her ceaseless flight,

Begins to tire, her panting dies away.

Her throbbing pulse grows weak, then ceases quite

And faint, she seeks the nearest port in sight.
And finds, beneath the shadow of a hill,

A little wayside station, trim and white.

Wherein she glides, as 'twere against her will.
And for a moment sweet, all seems divinely still.

But soon the very stillness magnifies

Minutest sounds. I can distinctly hear
The drowsy buzzing of the busy flies,

The humming of a bee grows loud and clear,
And even when it is no longer near

I still can trace it, sonorous and low,
Hovering 'mid flowers too distant to appear.

And 'neath all other sounds that come and go fl

SWEET SOLITUDE V?

A drowsy murmur swells from where deep waters
flow.

A solitary passenger alights

And greets the stationmaster as a friend.
I hear their low remarks, their loud " goodnights,"

And then the wicket's click that marks the end.
And presently I see a figure wend

Along a winding way, 'mid heath and broom ;
And when the path is hidden by a bend,

I still can see the figure dimly loom

Deep in a beechen wood that makes a twilight
gloom.

And then I feel a longing, keen, intense,
Unreasoning, to wander with him there.

And leave the world, and all its vain pretence,
Its mean ambition, and its sordid care.

And dwell for ever in that forest fair.

How peaceful 'tis ! Although the sun's still high,

There is a welcome freshness in the air
That whispers to me that the hour is nigh
When bird and beast prepare their daily death to
die,

O to lie down within that quiet wood

And die with them, and with them rise again,
And share henceforth their simple life and rude,

38 SWEET SOLITUDE

That knows no fevered pleasure and no pain !
But man is man, I know the wish is vain :

And as I gaze the train resumes her flight.
Once more her iron sinews heave and strain,

And scorning Nature's peace, and healthful night,
She flies to man's false joy and artificial light.

The Vagabond Boy.

Tramp, tramp, tramp,

I'll not be the first to rest:
I'll tramp it early or late,
But I like it late the best.

Give me the moon for a lamp,
Give me the sky for a dome,
Give me a lad that I like for a mate,
And a long white road for a home.

Tramp, tramp, tramp.

Over the frosty ground :
While night looms big with fate.
And the villages sleep around.

Give me the moon for a lamp,
Give me the sky for a dome,
Give me a lad that I like for a mate.
And a long white road for a home.

Tramp, tramp, tramp,
What is home to me
But a gaol with a wall and a gate?
I had rather by far be free.

Give me the moon for a lamp,
Give me the sky for a dome.
Give me a lad that I like for a mate.
And the whole wide world's my home.

Summer Heat.

What little breeze there is comes from the South,

And though in coming it has crossed the sea,
'Tis like a breath from Summer's fiery mouth.

And even hotter than still air can be :
It brought some clouds, but only two or three

High in the shimmering heav'n can now be seen :
The rest the noonday heat's intensity

Dissolved in floating haze of glistening sheen,
That forms a lace-like veil with deepest blue between.

The tide is high and almost at the turn ;

The fringe of weeds beyond is blanched and dry ;
The sands are red, and seem to glow and burn ;

And on the belt of common land hard by
The turf that rabbits nibble on the sly

Is parched and brown. Across it beaten tracks
Have formed a path, and here you may descry

Some beetles creeping out of sun-burnt cracks,
With graceful, slender legs, and green and golden

backs.

SUMMER HEAT 41

'Tis very still, for almost every bird

Is put to silence by the blinding heat,
The yellowhammer's call alone is heard,

Persistent and monotonously sweet,
In yonder fir, the squirrel's rustling feet

Betray its presence to a practised ear :
And on the ground below, the field-mouse fleet

Running amid the herbage brown and sere.
Utters from time to time his feeble note but clear.

One human creature — or is it a faun ?

Nay, 'tis a gypsy boy — alone is there.
If he has bathed at all, he has withdrawn

To bask upon the turf. His mop of hair
Is dry, and though his lean brown form is bare,

It shows no sign of damp from head to feet.
His light-contracted pupils boldly stare

Right at the sun, and seem to find it sweet:
He reigns alone 'mid brutes the genius of the heat.

Angels of Death.

To-day a hawk is hovering round a rick ;

His tail is curved below, his wings vibrate,
He hangs suspended for a while ; then quick

He drops upon his prey as stern as Fate.

To-night a ghostly owl sails on the wind,

With staring eyes aflame and pinions spread,

His horrid claws extended far behind
As ballast to the disproportioned head.

Grotesque and terrible he seems to us.

We shrink from " Nature red in tooth and claw,"
Yet Death is ever kind, and even thus

It is obedient to the heavenly law.

The owl may strike the silky-coated mole.
And so deliver him from painful age :

Is that a cause for tears? The little soul
Is safe with God beyond the raptor's rage.

A Child of Light.

The tide was low : long levels of wet sand

Mirrored a mackerel sky, green, orange, pink,
With the fiery gleams of opals. On the strand,

Against the sunlit ocean's shining brink,
I saw a lovely naked boy : his hair

Was like a glorious casque of burnished gold.
His eyes were stars, his slender form was fair

With iridescent colours manifold.
Gleaming like mother-of-pearl in parts, it showed

Semi-transparent ; here in the shade, 'twas blue ;
Here in the light, like sunset clouds it glowed ;

Here it was amber ; here a dusky hue :
Thus decked with rainbow tints, unearthly bright,

He seemed not mortal, but a child of light.

Warblers.

Big bird and little bird warble in the woods :

Hey tirra lirra ! Hey tirra lirra !
Carolling and piping in the merriest of moods :

O but their sweet songs are sweet !

Stormcock, laverock, willow-wren and thrush,
Chiff-chaff, blackbird, shufflewing and linnet.

Call to one another out of every tree and bush,
All about the woodland, over it and in it.

I know a voice, though, prettier than yours :

Hey tirra lirra ! Hey tirra lirra !
Hark to my lad, he is coming out of doors:

Ah, but his tones are sweet !

Society.

I walked with Will through bracken turning brown,
Pale yellow, orange, dun, and golden-red.

" God made the country and man made the town —
And woman made Society," he said.

" Last night at dinner, music, poetry, art,

And worst of all, religion, seemed but shams —

Mere fashionable crazes, fit for smart
Lip-criticism, jokes, and epigrams."

The morning sun lit up the glistening furze,

Now veiled by spiders' webs, and wet with dew ;

And on the ground lay prickly chestnut-burrs—
Some split, displayed a glossy nut or two.

Athwart the stillness came a tapping sound,
And then a bird-like laugh, and presently

A green woodpecker skimmed along the ground,
And disappeared behind a mighty tree.

46 SOCIETY

There, in a clearing, rose a bushy tail ;

Then down it went to let a small head rise ;
And through the grass, a little squirrel frail

Peeped out at us with brown enquiring eyes.

We roused a hare, that slowly trotted off,
Then sat upon his haunches unafraid :

Afar we heard the deer's clear call and cough,
And in a glen two fawns together played.

" Last night," I said, " how far away it seems !

Society ?. Nay, that was solitude !
We were alone then, with disturbing dreams ;

We wake to life and love here in this wood."

The Children's Mission.

The moon was shining mistily,

But ever more and more,
Above a leaden-coloured sea

That crept along the shore.

The children, having ceased to wade,

Enjoyed a spell of rc^t ;
And watched the saffron glory fade
From out the hazy West.

Then as they chatted quietly,

All softly unaware
A plaintive minor melody

Came floating through the air.

And when they turned, they spied afar

By the pavilion pier,
A light, that like a yellow star

Shone steadily and clear.

48 THE CHILDREN'S MISSION

Away they raced, and gathered round

A small harmonium :
Some sat upon the sandy ground,

Some stood, wide-eyed and dumb.

Then rose an old bald-headed man
With bony nose and chin.

And when the music ceased, began
A homily on sin.

The light soon died from shining eyes,
Bright faces turned away :

His theoloiiic subtleties

Seemed neither kind nor gay.

And yet he had some little skill,
And much had toiled ere then.

Converting little children till
They grew as grave as men.

He spoke of judgment, and of death.
Of which they never recked ;

And taught them many a shibboleth.
And how sect warred with sect.

And as he reasoned with them thus
And quoted from the Word,

They listened, sweetly serious,
But just a trifle bored.

THE CHILDREN'S MISSION 49

One waved a strand of bladder-wrack

A shade impatiently :
One yawned, and frankly turned his back

To watch the brightening sea.

And how I wished some baby boy

Would try converting him,
And show the Beauty, Love, and Joy,

To which his eyes seemed dim !

An Ancient Town.

Her spacious Church is picturesque,
Built not in one style but in all :

The nave is Norman Romanesque,
The later choir, transitional :

The tower's a stunted nondescript :

In Cromwell's time, 'tis said, 'twas stript
Of parapet and pinnacles ;

But still it serves to hold the bells.

Her High Street is a quaint arcade
Of overhanging fronts on props,

That serve for shelter or for shade
To modest but substantial shops.

Where London trash is marked for sale

At sums to make the stoutest quail,
While treasures worth their weight in gold,

Go cheap as dirt, because they're old.

Her best hotel is bad and dear,
3ut then 'tis marvellously ^^ chic" ;

AN ANCIENT TOWN 51

What if its stench of smoke and beer
Would make a squeamish stomach sick ?

Frequented by conservatives,

And patronized by squires, it gives

The hall-mark of its name, "The Crown,"

To all that quarter of the town.

The hub of all's the Market Place,

Where struts the farmer in his pride,
With burly form and rosy face,

His buxom dame close at his side.
The buildings grouped around it, range

From Early Georgian Corn Exchange
To timbered Jacobean inn,

And Guildhall of a style akin.

And here, and there, and everywhere.

Are empty yards, deserted lanes.
Outbuildings, wrecked beyond repair,

And warehouses with broken panes :
And mansions, falling to decay.

With gables facing every way,
Each one apart, in lonely state,

With high-walled lawn, and rusty gate.

Round half the town a river crawls,

And round the rest, low hills are curled.

Which serve in place of moat and walls
To part her from the modern world :

52 AN ANCIENT TOWN

But neither walls, nor moat, nor gate,
Needs she to keep her separate :

The sad-eyed ghosts of centuries
Are better guardians than these.

What's our new world to this old town,

From feverish ambition free.
Where none go up, and none go down.

But round and round eternally ?
What can it offer — wealth or power.

Or plaudits of the passing hour ?
Her children seek nor power nor wealth.

But simply love and peace and health.

Pretentious pride is there unknown,

Yet all have sober self-respect :
No other town is like their own,

They and their friends are the elect :
Too kind to scorn, too proud to brag.

They reck not how the world may wag ;
Newfangled ways may suit the rest,

For them the old paths are the best.

Wild Animals.

How closely shy wild animals and birds

Resemble boys ! I held once in my hand
A startled rabbit : though he used no words,

He spoke a tongue all children understand —
The language of coy looks ! Demure surprise

Came first of course, then fun, and then ere long
I saw the same sweet love-light in his eyes,

The same reposeful worship of the strong.
A bird I rescued from a narrow place

Where he was caught. Although I held him
fast.
At first he fluttered in my firm embrace ;

But soon he chirruped gaily, and at last,
Like lads, he seemed reluctant to depart :

I could have sworn 'twas some wing'd boyish
heart !

A Summer Night.

Now that tow'rd the close of day

Earth is still and cool,
Rabbits on the warren play

Like children out of school.
One will nibble; on the sly

Soon another suddenly
Springs upon him — off they fly
Helter skelter.

When the latest streak of red

Is gone from heaven's dome,
Comes a rushing overhead —

'Tis starlings flying home.
By the hedge beneath a tree

Ripples in the grass I see,
As a hedgehog timidly

Leaves his shelter.

Deeper grows the dusk : the dew
Gathers by degrees,

A SUMMER NIGHT 55

Soon a wheeling bat or two

Flits about the trees.
Tawny owls begin to hoot,

Here a fox, intent on loot,
Ventures forth on stealthy foot
Farms to Pillage.

Here a glow-worm in the grass

Signals to her mate.
Here you see grimalkin pass

Through a garden gate.
In the dark and silence deep

Half the things that fly and creep
Live their life the while we sleep
In the village.

My Holiday Home-

If I shut my eyes it will all come back

Just as it was when the June sun shined —
The long low reefs that are dark with wrack,

The old red sandstone cliffs behind,
The bare-legged children robed in white,

The butterfly boats in the bay,
The stucco villas, new and bright,

And the castle old and grey.

If I stop my ears I can catch the breeze

Soughing around on every side,
And the slumbrous tones of the tranquil seas

Ebbing away with the falling tide.
But 'tis only in dreams that I feel the sand,

And the wind, and the June sunshine.
And the touch of a hot little sunburnt hand.

And lips pressed close to mine.

The Fisher Boy-
Hark ! Hark ! List to the fisher boy

Carolling on like a lark !
Merrily, merrily ripples his melody

Over the sea in the dark.
Nightingale in the vale

Hush ! Let his song prevail.
Hark!

Hark ! Hark ! Who is a richer boy
Than the gay lad in the barque —

Richer in happiness, innocence, holiness-
Than the poor child in his sark ?

Cherubim, Seraphim
Listen and learn of him !
Hark!

The Boy Acrobat-

A flare of gas lights up his auburn hair,

Clear hazel eyes, and saucy sunburnt face,
And shows his laughing lips an open case

Of gleaming pearls. His throat alone is bare
Down to the dimpled chest, but everywhere

Close-clinging " fleshings " let the onlooker trace
His delicately moulded form, where grace

Enhances force, and force makes grace more fair.
Jester and acrobat combined, he flings

Airy impertinences at the men
Who lounge around — rough jokes devoid of stings

And even spiced with flattery now and then :
Touching by turns, as only Boyhood can,

The humour and the chivalry of Man.

Shells.

These were Geoff's — no rare examples

Fit for critical inspection :
Limpets, mussels, whelks are samples.

Here's the best of the collection —

What he called a " fan," * now faded,
Once as bright as his complexion !

Here's a yellow "token," f graded
Number One, a perfect treasure
(Cracked in two, and much abraded.)

Well I recollect his pleasure

When he chanced to find a " Venus ; "
And this ear-shell filled the measure !

* Common scallop,
t European cowrie.
E

6o SHELLS

Is there much to choose between us,

If it comes to drawing morals ?
We're all babes until death wean us !

See that house among the laurels,

Where the winter sun is shining,
Flashing on the casement quarrels :

Here he lived and died. Repining
Never can restore the kernel.

That's a shell ! A truce to whining ;
After all the soul's eternal.

Song : " Brown Town on Cameron Down."

Brown town on Cameron Down
Why are your streets so still ?

Cameron's chief is old, is old,

And the lad that he loves lies ill.

Grey day on Cameron Bay
Why does your sun not shine ?

Cameron's chief is old, is old,
And now he's the last of his line.

Expelled.

" The young squire's been expelled from school ! "
So ran the rumour. From a child
The boy had been " rebellious " : " wild "

They called him later aS a rule.

His widowed mother, pale and thin,

Was cold and proud as Lucifer :

I think a sinner was to her
A shade more hateful than his sin !

The boy was prisoned in the park —

She willed it so I make no doubt.

With gun or rod he mooned about
From early morning until dark.

" Wild " seemed a curious epithet

For one so langorous and weak :

A lad more absolutely meek
And crestfallen I never met.

EXPELLED 63

Yet there was something you might call
" Wild " in his shifty, furtive eyes —
The kind of " wildness" you surprise

In those of a trapped animal.

His Summer holidays were passed
In lounging near a sedgy lake :
There for long hours he dreamed awake,

And there they found him drowned at last.

In Lynn of old traditions say

They hanged a criminal of twelve :
They did not make him hang himself —

They had more mercy in those days !

A String Quartette.

The music room is bare and cold ;

Its windows face a moonlit sea :
Its shaded candles, four all told,

Illume the gloom but eerily.
One player only can I see,

A dark-eyed boy, with hair of gold ;
Deep shadow veils the other three —

A girl, a young man, and an old.

The boy gives out a joyous theme :

Bright, piquant, rhythmical, staccato
The shadowy three contented seem

To listen, \\ixnv[\m\r\^ pizzacato ;
But soon, con arco, agitato.

The 'cello wakes up with a scream :
The inner parts, in smooth legato,

Begin a sweet uneasy dream.

The boy now shifts an octave higher,
Ecstatic as a soaring lark :

A STRING QUARTETTE 65

And all at once the dying fire

Flares up and flickers in the dark :

And in its glow I can remark

The youth is flushed, as with desire ;

And now his bow has caught the spark,
And whispers what his hopes require.

The alto* full of shy delight

Clings to him in a fond embrace :
The flame expires : the moon's wan light

Falls softly on the old man's face ;
It lends a strange unearthly grace

To silver locks, now heavenly bright ;
And, like the ocean's voice, the bass

Floods with its music all the night.

*The second violin, which lakes the alto part : not the
viola, which takes the tenor, but is sometimes called the alto
because its part is written, in open score in the alto clef.

August-

(to a frirnd.)

I love this month in which we both were born ;

'Tis Summer still, but now the chilly breath
Of early Autumn freshens eve and morn,

And life is purified by kindly Death.
The lush exuberance of wanton Spring

Would overcharge the earth were she to stay :
And if she brought us flow'rs, did she not bring

A flock of weeds the Gardener wished away ?
If amorous birds have ceased their fervid strains,

Their cheery twitter's still a pleasant sound ;
The nightingale knew well that Love had pains

As well as pleasures ; maybe he has found,
As we, that Friendship, grounded upon Truth,

Is even sweeter than the loves of youth.

The Lonely Road-

The very roads that lead to it are lonely,

For miles around the countryside is bare,
The nearest villages are hamlets only,
And these are rare.

I never could discover where it ended,

For with the same meek air and woebegone
It neither turned nor mounted nor descended,
But went straight on.

From No Man's Land it crawled along to nowhere,
With scarce a change : once only did it pass
A clump of fir trees — nothing else will grow there
Except coarse grass.

Hard by these sombre pines, and shaded by them.

There is a stagnant, melancholy pond :
There are no other trees nor water nigh them
For miles beyond.

68 THE LONELY ROAD

Of all the weird and world-forsaken places

I ever met, this corner is the most :
It haunts me like dead, half-forgotten faces
Or like a ghost.

At home I find myself for ever asking

" How does the lonely road appear to-night? "
If it be fine I seem to see it basking
In wan moonlight :

But if the sky be overcast and clouded

I feel uneasy in my firelit room :
How unimaginably sad it must look shrouded
In awful gloom !

But I not only pity it, I love it ;

And more than ever yet would it be dear
If I could see it with dim stars above it
And no one near.

But best of all 'twould be with one — the dearest —

To linger there until the break of day,
Knowing that of all other men the nearest
Was leagues away.

Autumn Gold.

The woods are rich with g-olden leaves,

Gold lichen gilds the castle walls,
And on the cottage straw-thatched eaves

A wealth of golden glory falls,
The mere, aflame with sunset light,

A molten sea of gold appears ;
And golden are my dreams to-night

For love has crowned my mellow years.

Twilight-

All colours are submerged in misty grey,

And every outline is confused and blurred ;

But distant sounds are more distinctly heard
As faintly grows the murmur of the day.
In yonder forest, dim and far away,

I hear the warble of a drowsy bird ;

And though unseen the ocean gently stirred
Makes rhythmic music in the hazy bay.
An enervating breeze begins to blow,

Damp with the dews of night, and charged with
scents

That vary momently. White vapors roll
Along the vales, and rising from below
Blot out the world, and solitude immense
Falls from the chilly stars and numbs my soul.

The Harvest Moon-

0 holy moon serenely bright

How fair though art ! Yet in thy light

1 see a little face as white,

As beautiful, as calm, and quite
As pure as thine.

Around the world thou runn'st thy race
And show'st thy disk in every place,
But here I kiss a little face
Whose delicate, unearthly grace
Is mine, all mine !

Fellow Feeling.

The wind is rough and flecks the waves with foam,

But as the lonely lighthouse point I near
'Mid sheltering rocks I see a cottage home.

Upon the casement window-blind appear

The flickering gleam of lights that come and go
And moving shadows. Presently I hear

Light steps behind me on the frozen snow.

An eager boy runs by on flying feet,
Flings wide the door, and ere it closes lo !

There swims before my eyes a vision sweet —

Above a board set out with homely fare,
But decked with flowers and draped with linen neat,

A mother's face, pale, thin, and lined with care,
But lit with love : while fragrant fumes of tea
And savoury odours cheer the frosty air.

FELLOW FEELING 73

At first I gaze unmoved, but suddenly

My breath comes quick, I scarce can understand
Myself what stirs me so. What do I see ?

A blotted sonnet in a schoolboy hand
Left on the desk ; and in a bookcase old

Three glorious names in isolation grand —

Keats, Shelley, Shakespeare writ in burnished gold.

The Pine Wood.

Behind some villas on a hill,

Upon a plot of rocky ground,
A strip of pine wood lingers still,

As 'twere a forest queen discrowned.

Dry rubbish has been shot around
And even on her stony heights

For many a year about her frowned
Advertisements of building sites.

But now the invading town decays,

And up the hill no longer creeps,
And so the little pine wood stays

Secure among her rubbish heaps.

But on her trees no squirrel leaps,
No birds upon the branches sing :

By day and night alone she sleeps
Nor seems to dream of anything.

So left by builder, beast, and bird.
The wood is held a haunted place.

THE PINE WOOD 75

And never are her pine trees stirred
Save when the winds each other chase :
But children through her alleys race

With mingled terror and delight,
And lovers in her shadows pace

In sweet seclusion night by night.

A Brief Life-

THE CASTLE.

The Castle, once a rugged Norman keep,

Has been transformed into an English home :
Its ancient moat, o'erflown, has formed a deep

Pellucid pool, where swift and swallow roam ;
But where the drawbridge hung, a bridge of stone

With mossed and lichened piers usurps the place :
The crumbling barbican remains alone,

An ivied tower whose force has turned to grace.
The level lawns are now with daisies white,

The meads around with golden cups are gay,
Peace spreads her pinions o'er it day and night,

And sweet contentment broods there night and day
The chatelain's a slender orphan boy,

His mother's pride, my friend, our common joy.

THE VILLAGE.

The village nestles 'neath the parish church,
A simple fane with one low massy tower :

A BRIEF LIFE T]

A purling brook 'mid willow, ash, and birch,

Meanders down to lend the mill its power ;
There, dammed by weirs, it forms a foamy head.

Where whirling waters, eddying round and round.
Can find no vent, till by the race they're led

To turn the great black wheel with whirring sound.
Next comes the gabled inn, and last the green,

Which serves at sunset as a meeting-place
For old and young. There oft my friend is seen ;

And ever when he comes on every face
The sunlight of his beauty seems to shine,

All hearts are glad, but none so glad as mine.

THE GRAMMAR SCHOOI .

The grammar school has grey embattled walls,

Wide mullioned windows, and escutcheoned gate,
And class-rooms like our smaller college halls

Where comfort is combined with modest state.
There for four hundred years the happy hum

Of busy human bees has told of toil
By which the flowers of classic lore become

The all-devouring scholar's honeyed spoil.
Thither my friend, with rosy farmer's sons,

The lawyer's lad, the parish doctor's boy.
And other country children, daily runs

To draw from Rome and Athens' wells with joy.
Yet, loved by all, he lives from all apart;

They have his presence, I alone his heart.

78 A BRIEF LIFE

THE FOREST.

My friend trots by my side in easy pose,

Head back, hands low, the unneeded whip at rest ;
His slender legs, encased in silken hose,

Against his pony's glossy flanks close pressed :
The evening air with scented limes is sweet,

The forest glades are still as still can be.
The grass is grateful to our horses' feet.

And all is peace and deep tranquility.
The wood's our favourite haunt : upspringing elm,

Aspiring poplar, birch with silver bole.
Broad-branching oak, the monarch of the realm.

And graceful ash, we love to think, share soul
And heart with us — nay there are moments when

They seem more near us than our fellow-men.

THE CHURCHYARD.

I knew my darling bore a tainted life,

And that he suffered for a parent's sin :
To-day I heard that brief would be his strife.

We passed the churchyard and he drew me in ;
He led me to his father's marble tomb —

A pompous structure 'neath a mighty yew,
Whose shadow bathed it in eternal gloom.

We gazed in silence ; then, as we withdrew,
A little shyly but with quiet pride,

" They shall not lay me there with him," he said,
" But in yon sunny corner side by side

A BRIEF LIFE 79

Mother and I will rest when we are dead."
And then, more shyly still. " If you agree,
We'll slumber all together there — we three."

THE LANRS.

While he can walk we wander in the lanes :

At first afar for rarer flowers we roam,
But as his strength with summer slowly wanes,

We draw our orbits close around his home.
Or sit and listen to the clamourous daws,

Or watch the gauzy dragon-fly, or mark
How briar and thorn bear reddening hips and haws

And bramble berries grow more plump and dark.
And oft his schoolfellows come one by one,

Awkward and mute, in country boyish way,
And linger with him till the day is done

To show the love their tongues could never say.
And now I learn his heart's not less my own

But rather more since 'tis not mine alone.

THE STARS.

My friend is gone and his sweet mother too,
They left us with the swallows, and their dust

Lies in the family vault beneath the yew —
Sinner with sinned against, just with unjust.

My love at last so willed, and I am glad
He died at peace with all men at the end :

8o A BRIEF LIFE

And all he loved, I love : the lawyer's lad,

A sickly boy, is my especial friend.
And when the night is clear, and there's no moon,

We roam abroad and gaze upon the stars ;
And like to think that we shall journey soon

To some sweet world nor sin nor folly mars ;
And that the stars are lamps that day and night

Afford our Father's many mansions light.

Resurrection.

When the shadow of war swept over our land

Steeping our souls in sorrow,
How in our grief could we understand

What it would bring on the morrow ?
What has it brought ? A faith more grand,

Holier hopes, and a larger life,
And a pact of the peoples so wisely planned

That I trust it will end all strife !

Though a sunray of peace shines over our land

Filling our hearts with laughter,
Little e'en now do we understand

All that may follow hereafter.
If Love will bind with his silken band

Noble and commoner great and small.
And master and man work hand in hand,

And the chief be the servant of all,

The Cycle of Thought.

Sane Wisdom in the ordered universe

Has ever first beheld the Hand of God ;
Then Man, with choice of better or of worse ;

Then dimly through a mist a crown and rod :
But often ere the crown or rod descend,

Man falls asleep and lies beneath the sod :
And then perplexed she cries " Is this the end ?

Is there but one award to good and ill ?
Js there a God ? Has Man indeed freewill ? "
But Nature answers not, and all is still.

Why should she answer ? She has said her say :

" You see in me effects, they prove a Cause,
Man hears a Voice within, if he obey

And walk in harmony with all my laws
He will not live unhappy. If he die — "

But here she seems to smile at us and pause ;
Some deem they hear her whisper " He is gone

Beyond my province. He has journeyed on
To realms on which my suns have never shone ! '

THE CYCLE OF THOUGHT 83

So human thought whirls ever round and round,

The midwife's son, who acted as midwife
To all succeeding" sages, duly found

The Hand of God revealed in human life:
" Learn but of Him," he cried, " And you will find

Virtue as easy as flute-playing." Strife
'Twixt Good and Evil, Love with Lust combined,

Was Plato's problem. Then the Stagirite
To Nature turned, and knew no other light
Till Nature's sun went down and all was night.

These lights and shadows passed across the stage :

Fate to the father of Greek tragedy
Is all in all : in vain the heathen rage,

God shines alone in awful majesty.
To Sophocles God's light's a little lamp

That leads the human will, but leaves it free ;
But when this flickers out before the damp

And chilly wind of Death, Euripides,
Lost in a labyrinth of sophistries,
No clue discovers and no exit sees.

Does human thought then make no progress ? Nay,
For every cycle's larger than the last.

Our own at dawn had Christ to lead the way.
And show us God more plain than in the past ;

At noon the Church, where man appears as Saint,

84 THE CYCLE OF THOUGHT

More lovable than sage and twice as gay :
And if at eventide our light be faint,

And Science see in Nature but a tomb,
Already God again begins to loom

Ten thousand times more vast beyond our gloom !

" Rex Regum-"

Our God is greater than the dreamer dreams :
The King of earthly kings — how small it seems !
Our speck of cinder dust spins round a spark
Like millions more that hardly fleck the dark.
'Tis somewhat disconcerting first to find
We bulk so little in the Master Mind :
But after all our case is none the worse
Since God is equal to His universe,
And brings a thousand mighty laws to bear
To hold in equipoise our every hair.

Stranger and Pilgrim.

Though still I sojourn in this world awhile,
I wear a scallop shell, and feel as one
Who views his country by a setting sun

And knows that ere another morn shall smile

His ship will wing her flight for many a mile.
He sees the home in which his years begun,
The fields wherein his daily toil was done.

But now the ocean dwarfs the little isle.

And even as he loiters listlessly

From distant bells he hears a solemn chime
Which warns him that the parting hour is near

And so he turns and gazes out to sea,
And dwells in fancy on a far off clime

Till hope becomes so strong she conquers Fear.

W. Jolly anu Sons, Ltd., Aberdeen.

BY THE SAME AUTHOR

SONNETS, SONC;S AND BALLADS. 2s. 6d.

" Friendship between man and man has inspired some of
Mr. E. E. Bradford's happiest poems. . . . Mr Swinburne, as
a writer of poems dealing with and appeahng to young
people, stands unequalled ; but Mr Bradford's ' Children's
Verse ' has the right ring about it, and we like the gentle
humour and quizzical turn of ' The Pleasures of a Face-
ache ! ' " — Westminster Review.

" Cheery and wholesome." — Times.

"While its many songs celebrate the beauties of Nature,
their ardour rises when they catch a suggestion of some
divine work of creation ; and while its ballads — short, vigorous
and dramatic pieces with a story to tell — are too objective to
be directly devout, they are never slow to make a telling
effect of religious emotion. The book, for the rest, is
accomplished in its metrical craft, and shows a scholar's
regard for the classical traditions of English verse."

Scotsman.

" He sings from the heart, and it would be difificult to find a
page on which the verses could be read with indifference.
The reason is partly to be found in the poetical gifts of the
writer. While he does not follow art for art's sake, he is
never blind to beauty or deaf to music, and in poems such as
' Love is for Ever,' 'A Mission to the Angels,' 'The Price of
Blood,' the fundamental point in him is no less in evidence
than the earnest lover of his country and his fellow-men."

Glase;ow Herald.

PASSING THE LOVE OF WOMEN, AND OTHER
POEMS. i,s. dd. net. {Out of print.)

" Friendship between man and man, and even more, the
friendship between man and youths, form the theme of many

PASSING THE LOVE OF WOMEN, AND OTHER
VOEMS—corM.

of Dr Bradford's poems. He is as alive to the beauty of
unsullied youth as was Plato. If his religion is Christianity,
tinged by Platonism, we must remember that Neo-PIatonism
was the philosophy of Christianity until the Middle Ages,
when Aristotle came in with the Schoolmen and banished it
from the theology of the Western Church. In graceful blank-
verse Dr. Bradford retells the legends of Jupiter and
Ganymede, Hercules and Hylas, and Apollo and Hyacinthus.
We congratulate him on his success in attempting to
introduce rhyme into English Sapphics. . . . There is much
else in this volume to which we should like to draw the
attention of our readers. We must content ourselves,
however, with commending warmly to them this collection of
virile, melodious and scholarly verse." — IVestminster Review.

*' These verses are distinguished by a sense of style and
rhythm. ... Of the friendship between man and man,
'passing the love of women,' Dr Bradford is a consistent and
occasionally an eloquent singer." — AthencBtim.

"The longer works, such as 'Apollo and Hyacinthus' and
' The Sculptor,' remain throughout on a level of accomplish-
ment which is exceptional among minor poets, especially when
tempted by the fatal fluency and ease of blank-verse ; and
some of the lyrics, sonnets and other short poems are
certainly worthy of critical approval. The author's three
charming stanzas to ' Rudolf,' and a lyric entitled ' Narcissus,'
stand from the rest . . . but we must add that on the whole
the scansion and rhyme are excellent." — Academy.

" The verse of this volume is of high accomplishment."

Literary World.

" There are few present-day writers of poetry who can
equal the Rev. E. E. Bradford in felicity of expression,
whether in description of the beauties of Nature or of the
emotions and experiences of human iife."

J. Y. in The Dundee Advertiser.

" Dr. Bradford certainly has a sense of beauty."

Cambridge Review.

IN QUEST OF LOVE, AND OTHER POEMS.

4^'. ^d. net. {Out of print.)

"The title poem is an eloquent disquisition in four-line
stanzas on love of different kinds and among different
nations . . . virile, well-turned verse." — Titnes.

"A breezy vigour inspires these poems, making them
pleasant to turn to after the whimperings of much modern
poetry." — Evening Standard.

" In a former volume of poetry the Rev. Dr. E. E. Bradford
gave some aspects of the exalted friendship between man and
man, 'passing the love of women,' and his exceptional gifts
enabled him to present this subject in a manner that rendered
it highly acceptable. The present book, ' In Quest of Love,
and other poems,' is a worthy companion. . . .

Western Daily Press.

LAYS OF LOVE AND LIFE. 2s 6d net.
{Out of print.)

*' Dr Bradford's thoughts certainly do not run into the
same mould as those of most other ecclesiastical writers ! He
is sometimes lacking in the odour of sanctity, but then he
makes up with fresh air ! He has a verve and a brisk
robustness that carry us along with him unprotesting, even if
at times somewhat out of breath. He can rise to pure,
strong poetry, as in the poem 'To Boys Unknown,' but
perhaps he pleases us most when he writes charming little
things like 'Love's Unreason' and 'Shades of Night.'
Very attractive, too, we find his picture of the dying boy of
seventeen— ' Why Make Ye This \doV"— Literary World.

"There are many fine and haunting lines in 'Lays of Love
and Life,' by the Rev. E. E, Bradford . . . conspicuously the
exquisite sonnet on ' The Pure in Heart,' the verses entitled
' Humour and Pathos,' and ' Individuality.' " — Lady.

LAYS OF LOVE AND JJFE—contd.

" Dr. Bradford . . . has vigour, fearlessness, something to
say, and a manner of saying it which makes an impression on
the reader . . . the author understands and is a lover of
life." — Cambridge Revieio.

" Dr. Bradford enjoys a distinct talent for versifying, and
some of his lines are good." — Tablet.

THE NEW CHIVALRY, AND OTHER POEMS.
(^OiU of print.)

" Dr. Bradford's numerous books of verse have been
devoted specially to hymning male friendships. He has the
gift of fervent and musical expression ; and we like him best
when as in ' My God.' He reveals his devotion to spiritual
things and to the manifestation of the divine in all that is
beautiful." — Times.

" Variety of subject and treatment, shrewd thoughts, and
vigorous expression are features of Dr. Bradford's verse."

Athenceum.

"His technique in the matter of rhyme is very good, and
gives a flavour to all his work. Apart from its literary merit,
the courage and honesty with which he faces different
questions are worthy of all admiration." — Literary World.

" Dr. Bradford's latest book of poems is a call to the young
men of England to ' turn away from the wench with her
powder and paint ' : and the first poem ' The Call ' is the best
lyric in the book. It is followed by 'The New Chivalry,' a
passionate diatribe against the morals of the present day, the
hypocrisy of so-called pious folk, and the habit of early
marriage so common in cities and among industrial
workers. . . . For the rest, Dr. Bradford is an eloquent
singer of the friendship of man and man, and man and boy,
and of the justice of God, . . . Dr. Bradford's poems are
vigorous and refreshing. . . . The book should be read by
all earnest schoolmasters." — Oxford Magazine.

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